Thursday, January 23, 2014

Syria: Al Qaeda Training Western Citizens for Terror Abroad

Al-Qaeda
has been using the influx of foreign nationals to Syria to train
potential terrorists to begin cells abroad, specifically in the United
Kingdom (UK) and European Union (EU), Britain's The Telegraph reported Monday.

A defector from the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant
(ISIS) and Western security sources confirmed to the British news agency
what UK and other intelligence officials have long suspected: that at
least some foreign nationals who leave to fight in the Syrian civil war
plan to use their experience and training there to attack their native
countries upon their return.

The defector, speaking from the Turkish border - a route
commonly taken by foreign Islamist fighters into Syria - said that Al
Qaeda has been training recruits from Europe, the UK and the US how to
make and detonate car bombs and suicide vests in anticipation of being
sent home to start new terror cells.

“They talked often about terrorist attacks," the defector, who
would only give the name of Murad, stated to the British daily. "The
foreigners were proud of 9/11 and the London bombings. The British,
French and American mujahideen [holy warriors] in the room started
talking about places that they wanted to bomb or explode themselves in
Europe and the United States. Everyone named a target. The American said
he dreamed of blowing up the White House.”

Syrian Foreign Minister Feisal Mekdad stated to BBC last week that Western officials have reached out to the Syrian regime over the jihadists, in light of the news that hundreds of foreign nationals were involved in terror there.

And earlier this month, a Lebanese TV channel exposed how British Islamists led by notorious preacher Anjem Choudary were actively recruiting Muslims to fight in Syria.

This report presents the first official confirmation from a
Syrian rebel source that Western fighters are being trained to
perpetuate terror abroad. The Telegraph estimates that at least 500
British citizens have joined the fighting in the war-torn country - and
that the situation is only getting worse.

The Syrian Civil War has been the ground zero for an all-out
holy war between Sunni and Shia Muslims, in the wake of an uprising by
the Syrian people against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, who
identifies with the Alawite sect, which is an offshoot of Shia islam.

Foreign nationals have poured into Syria to fight on both sides
of the conflict, raising concerns that the increasingly sectarian
conflict could spill over into not only neighboring countries (as has
already occurred in Lebanon and Iraq), but even further afield, as
Islamist fighters from across the globe receive ideological
instruction and battlefield experience which they could potentially take
back home with them.

The foreign national problem is not a new one. Canadian, American, and European
fighters have made jihad videos from Syria; British Muslims, in
particular, have been flocking to the war from all sectors of society.

Al Qaeda officials have been suspected of reaching out
specifically to British university graduates, according a Daily
Mail report last month. Some British Muslim women have also been joining the rebel forces, marrying Islamists "in the name of a global Jihad".